Tag Archives: food

A few of my favorite things: Savory Pies

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Pies! Pies! Pies! oh I miss Georgie Pie – a fast food chain that was around when I was a kid in New Zealand.

  

(Photo credits: kiwianarama.co.nz; georgiepienewzealand.blogspot.com)

When I go home to New Zealand, one of my must haves are meat pies. Meat pies and ketchup are part of our culture, hence on my list of one of my favorite things.

I have three savory pies that I love…smoked fish pie, the classic bacon and egg pie and lastly the potato top pie (filling is typically mince with vegetables – mince=ground beef with gravy for the US folks 😉 ). Here are the recipes for the bacon and egg pie and the potato top pie – I hope you enjoy them 🙂

Bacon and Egg Pie (makes 4 individual pies)

Ingredients 

1 sheet Pillsbury Pie Crust
5 eggs (lightly beaten)
1/2 onion (diced)
4 slices Canadian bacon (diced)
salt and pepper
1/4 cup frozen peas (optional)
1/2 cup grated cheese

  1. Preheat oven at 375 degrees F (190 degrees C)
  2. Unroll the sheet of pie crust, cut out the 4 circles – you may need to re-roll edges to get the 4th one. Place each into the pie dish.
  3. Place the chopped onion,  bacon and frozen pies on the bottom of each pie crust.
  4. Add the egg mixture, salt and pepper over the top to cover the filling (~3/4 fill). I stir the ingredients slightly.
  5. Sprinkle the cheese on the top
  6. Place in the oven for 30 mins or until the egg is cooked through
  7. Take them out of the oven and let stand and cool for 5 -10 mins
  8. Serve with either ketchup or a tasty tomato relish (my preference ;-))

NOTE: The egg will rise to look like a mountain – don’t worry as when it cools it will deflate slightly.

Potato Top Pie (makes 4 individual pies)

Ingredients

Mashed Potatoes:
2 russet potatoes (peeled and diced)
1 Tbsp butter
1/2 cup milk
salt

  1. Cook potatoes in salted boiling water for ~15 minutes.
  2. Drain the water when cooked, add butter and milk and mash. Allow to cool.

Mince:
1 tsp oil
1/2 pound ground beef (250 g mince)
1/2 onion (diced)
2 tsp flour
1/4 cup beef stock
2 Tbsp Ketchup
salt and pepper
1/4 cup frozen peas

  1. Heat fry pan, add oil.
  2. Add the onions and cook until clear.
  3. Add ground beef and brown.
  4. In a cup add the flour and slowly stir in the stock, you are making a gravy – you don’t want lumps :-). Add it to the ground beef.
  5. Add Ketchup, seasoning and 1/4 cup of frozen peas.
  6. Take mixture once heated through off the heat and put aside to cool.

Pie
1 sheet Pillsbury Pie Crust
1/2 cup grated cheese

  1. Preheat oven at 400 degrees F (200 degrees C)
  2. Unroll the sheet of pie crust, cut out the 4 circles – you may need to re-roll edges to get the 4th one. Place each into the pie dish.
  3. Put a 1/4 cup of the mince in each of the pie crusts, fill 3/4 of the pie.
  4. In a piping bag, add mash potatoes. Pipe the potatoes in to rosettes on the top of the mince mixture. Cover the top completely with rosettes.
  5. Sprinkle with Cheese (you could add a sprinkle of paprika for color on the cheese).
  6. Cook for 15-20 mins or until the top becomes golden.
  7. Take it out, allow to cool for 5 mins. and server with ketchup ;-).

A few of my favorite things: Quiches

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Making my first crusted quiche was a daunting task – first off I had to make pastry, which always looks so complicated. It was not too bad just time consuming. I made a ham and cheese quiche (quiche lorraine). It turned out perfectly, and everyone loved it.

Here are two of my favorite quiche recipes.

Quiche Lorraine (Ham and Cheese Quiche)

Ingredients:

Pastry:
215g flour (1 3/4 cup of flour)
100g cold butter (US: 1 stick of butter)
2 Tbsp cold water

Quiche Filling:
30 g butter (2 Tbsp)
1 onion (finely chopped)
6 slices canadian bacon
3 eggs
185 ml cream (3/4 cup cream)
80g grated Cheese (Gruyere works well)
Salt and Pepper to taste
1/4 tsp nutmeg

To make the pastry:
Add the flour to a medium sized bowl, add butter chopped in small pieces. Using your fingers rub the flour and butter together until it appears like crumbs. Make a well in the middle of the bowl and add the 2 Tbsp of cold water. Using a fork, mix into flour, form a ball with the dough. Wrap in dough in plastic wrap and place in the fridge for 20 minutes.

Preheat over to 190 degrees C. Take the dough and place it between two layers of plastic wrap and roll out the dough to fit a 25cm dish. Place the dough in the dish and but it back in the fridge for 20 more minutes. When ready take the crust from the fridge, and put a piece of baking paper over the quiche bottom and place a pie weight chain on the paper to hold it in place  – you are needing to bake the base blind. Place in the middle of the oven, for 15 minutes. Take out of the oven and allow to cool.

To make the filling:
Place the 30g of butter in a fry pan on medium heat, melt then add the onion and Canadian bacon for ~10 minutes. Allow to cool and then place it over the bottom of the quiche crust.

Place the eggs, cream and cheese (only 40 g) in a bowl and whisk lightly. Add salt and pepper to your taste preference. Place mixture in the quiche crust. Top with the other 40g of cheese and sprinkle the 1/4 tsp of nutmeg. Place in the oven for 30 minutes until the quiche is cooked through and golden.

Potato Self-Crusting Quiche (Vegetarian)

Ingredients:
2 medium potatoes (diced and cooked)
1 onion (finely chopped)
2 -3 cloves garlic
1 tsp of butter
6 eggs
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup of flour
1 can creamed corn
1 cup cheese
salt and pepper
1/2 tomato (sliced)
1/2 bell pepper (sliced)
1/2 tsp basil (dried) or a few leaves of chopped basil fresh

For the potatoes, I leave the skin on but either way will work. Cook the 1 in diced pieces of potato in a pot of boiling water for ~10-15 minutes. You want then cooked but firm. Drain the water and leave the potatoes to cool.

Preheat oven at 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).

In a fry pan, melt the butter, place garlic and onion and cook until the onion is glassy/clear. Allow to cool.

In a bowl, add eggs lightly beat, add milk and flour, mix but don’t over mix, flour should still be a little lumpy. Add potato, onion mix, creamed corn, and 1/2 cup cheese, salt and pepper – stir.

Place the Quiche mixture in a glass dish which has been lightly greased with butter. Top with 1/2 cup of cheese, tomatoes and bell pepper. Sprinkle basil on top.

Place in the oven for 45 minutes or until cooked through and golden.

In addition, check out one of my favorite books is Sarah Branbery – “Tarts”, you should try the spinach, feta and pine nuts quiche.

A few of my favorite things: Savory Breakfast

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When I think of a savory breakfast, I would have to say an egg needs to be in my breakfast. I love eggs especially poached but I will take them scrambled, over medium (white cooked, yellow runny), or a boiled egg (again like my white cooked and yellow runny).

Some folks find poaching an egg difficult. I am especially picky with them and don’t like them to have a very strong vinegar taste to them (using vinegar stops the whites from spreading – you add it to the boiling water). I actually found these cool silicone poach egg pods which you place your egg into, then once the water is boiling add the pod into the water. You get the perfect semi-circle shaped poached egg, and no vinegar taste – PERFECT!!!

The first of my recipes, no surprise uses poached eggs.

Breakfast Open Sandwich

Ingredients (serving size: 1)

1/2 english muffin
1/4 avocado
2-3 slices tomato
2 slices Canadian bacon
few leaves of spinach
1 poached egg
salt and pepper

I start with boiling the water for the poached egg. As I am using the poached egg pods above – I follow their instructions for cooking the egg. I leave it in the water ~5-6 minutes in the pods.

While the egg is cooking, add two pieces of Canadian bacon to a fry pan and cook; toast the english muffin in the toaster.

Once these steps are completed, spread the avocado on the muffin. I stack the sandwich then, in this order:
Spinach
Canadian Bacon
Tomato
Poached egg

Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve immediately.

Breakfast Bratkartoffeln (Fried Potatoes)

I discovered one of my all time favorite meals in a “pub-like” restaurant Vetters Brauhaus in Heidelberg, Germany – the meal is called Bratkartoffeln. The fried potatoes are fried in a cast iron skillet in probably bacon fat and topped with fried eggs.

This recipe is a twist on that, a light and healthy version that makes a great breakfast or brunch item

Ingredients (serves 1-2)

1 Tbsp Olive oil
2/3 cup frozen grated potato (in the US – Ore-Ida Country Style hash browns)
1/2 cup grated zucchini
1/2 bell pepper, chopped (green works best)
1/2 yellow onion, chopped
2 slices Canadian Bacon, chopped
1 tsp dried Paprika
1/2 tsp dried Thyme
Salt and Pepper (to taste)
1 Egg (Poached or Fried)
Chives (optional)

Add the olive oil to a heated fry pan, add the frozen potatoes (Hash browns) – stand back a little in case of initial spitting of the olive oil when add the potatoes.  Leave for approximately 1 minute just to defrost the potatoes a little.

Add the zucchini, onion, bell pepper to the potatoes. Spread the ingredients across the fry pan surface. Try not to flip the contents often – it will become mushy if you do. Sprinkle paprika, thyme and salt and pepper over the contents. Cook until the potato mixture until it starts to turn golden brown on the bottom and flip the mixture.

Add the Canadian bacon. Again once the bottom starts to turn a golden color flip the potatoes one last time. Once cooked, plate the potatoes (could split for two if you want – add an extra egg if you do), add the poached or fried egg on the top. Sprinkle a little salt, pepper and chives on top of the egg and server immediately.

NOTE: I love the yolks of my egg running over the potatoes… if you break the yolk and it spreads over your potatoes it tastes fantastic!!